Jonathan Edwards’ triple jump world record celebrates its 30th birthday
August 7, 1995, has gone down in athletics history as a momentous day for the sport.
It was at that year’s World Athletics Championships in the Swedish city of Göteborg that British triple jumper Jonathan Edwards bounded out to a world record 18.29m.
The mark still stands untouched 30 years later.
In the iconic Ullevi Stadium, renowned for its high-performance athletics track, which was also to host the European Athletics Championships 11 years later, Edwards firstly added 18 centimetres to his own world record with his opening leap of 18.16m on Mondo’s innovative prefabricated athletics track, the first ever legal performance over the landmark 18-metre mark.
Edwards then stretched out even further to a scarcely believable 18.29m one round later.
His stunning performance caused reverberations around the world with Edwards appearing on the front pages of hundreds of newspapers and magazines.
“Edwards strains belief,” was the headline of the American magazine Track and Field News. “How much further can this man jump?” gasped the British publication Athletics Weekly on its front cover.
To put matters into a contemporary context, seven men have since gone over 18 metres in the subsequent three decades but, while Edwards’ historic mark has been challenged, it has never been beaten.
“I was really focused straight away but I didn’t think I would break the world record in the first round. I wasn’t aware of quite how far they [his two jumps] were, and I was quite surprised when the scoreboard showed was 18.29m,” reflected a stunned Edwards back in 1995, who went on to be voted that year’s World and European Athlete of the Year.
"It’s just so surreal though, I’ve broken the world record twice and it had lasted 10 years before I broke it earlier in the season. It just doesn’t make sense,” added Edwards at the time.
It was a historic moment for Mondo as well as the supplier of a World Athletics Championships track for the second time, following on from providing the track for Rome’s Olympic Stadium eight years earlier.
Other memorable marks on Mondo’s innovative prefabricated athletics track in Göteborg include a stunning 200m/400m double by the American sprinter Michael Johnson and a 400m hurdles world record of 52.61 by his compatriot Kim Batten.
Mondo’s athletic track legacy has gone on to be the track supplier for the main stadium (as well as the warm-up track on many occasions) at another 12 World Athletics Championships, including this year’s championships in Tokyo which will be held between 13-21 September.
Since 1987, Mondo tracks have become synonymous with elite performance in athletics, with 17 world records set on their tracks at the World Athletics Championships, they and have provided the track at six of the last seven editions.
Mondo’s athletic track legacy has gone on to be the track supplier for the main stadium (as well as the warm-up track on many occasions) at another 12 World Athletics Championships, including this year’s championships in Tokyo which will be held between 13-21 September.
Since 1987, Mondo tracks have become synonymous with elite performance in athletics, with 17 world records set on their tracks at the World Athletics Championships.
The organizing committees of the following World Athletics Championships have chosen Mondo prefabricated athletics tracks:
· Rome 1987
· Göteborg 1995
· Athens 1997
· Sevilla 1999
· Edmonton 2001
· Paris Saint-Denis 2003
· Helsinki 2005
· Daegu 2011
· Moscow 2013
· Beijing 2015
· London 2017
· Doha 2019
· Budapest 2023
· Tokyo 2025